This invention relates to cartons, and more particularly, to a carton assembly for use in connection with the shipment of pre-sorted mail and the like.
Pre-sorted mail and bulk mail are mutually advantageous for the postal service and the sender. The postal service can handle pre-sorted mail and bulk mail more efficiently and expeditiously than mail which has not been pre-sorted and grouped. This results in considerable economic savings to the postal service. To encourage the use of pre-sorted mail, the postal service currently gives a one or two penny discount in the price of postage per pre-sorted envelope to the economic advantage of the sender.
Usually senders obtain boxes of envelopes for subsequent stuffing from an envelope manufacturer, distributor or supplier. Some of the boxes have top and bottom portions which when separated provide two open top trays in which the envelopes can be removed and stuffed with the material to be mailed.
After the envelopes have been stuffed, the envelopes are often put into different shipping containers for mailing and the original boxes disposed of. This practice is tedious and time consuming and often results in the loss of many man hours in transferring the stuffed envelopes from the original boxes to new shipping containers. Furthermore, this practice results in enormous waste of boxes to the economic detriment of the sender.
Sometimes, the stuffed envelopes are kept in open top trays and the trays are covered for mailing with separate sleeves or lids obtained from venders or from the postal service. The cost of purchasing these sleeves or lids tends to be very expensive for the sender and/or postal service, especially when voluminous amounts of pre-sorted mail are involved. Furthermore, it is often cumbersome and time consuming to attach the sleeve and lids to the trays.
It is therefore desirable to provide a telescopic carton assembly for delivery of unstuffed envelopes to the sender, which can be readily and easily converted into two self-contained shipping containers into which stuffed and pre-sorted mail can be shipped without purchase of auxiliary sleeves and lids.